How can you get senior executives mandate Enterprise 2.0?

Research studies have repeatedly emphasized that good IT governance is a result of effective leadership at the highest levels (Lallana, 2010) . Social Media implementation in enterprises is like any technology initiatives require a leadership support to be successful. Leaders commitment can bring the initiative together, establish it as a priority, and drive it to successful completion (Seven, 2001) .However, adopting technological innovation generate challenges to organizations because it doesn’t only addresses changes in technology but also require the organization to change the way its runs its business in terms of processes, workflows, policies, procedures and structure (Serour & Henderson-Sellers, 2002)

To accomplish that, CIOs will be the best candidates. It is not an easy task for CIOs to have board members, CEO, senior executives on board to support the use of Enterprise 2.0 for internal and external communications. Campaigning for such task is a long, tedious work for so many reasons like dealing with business managers who are often less IT savvy. As well , CIOs will always need to be well equipped and convincing to provide answers to ‘What is in it for me!’ & ‘Is it a Risk free thing’ type of questions.

However, It is not difficult to answer the benefits and cost effective questions since most social media networks are relatively free and the uses of social media seem endless. For example , It brings firms closer to their customers, communication ,knowledge sharing , project management…act. On the other hand, the risk question is the real concern. Security, loss of control, impact on reputation, information
reliability, and productivity impact are among the high profile issues in using Enterprise social networks.
There is no simple solution to manage these risks .Literature shows that many firms have its way of handling some of these issues. For example, Phoebe Venkat a Global Communications Senior Manager at Tyco Fire Protection states that to help firms with control issue, it is better to have ‘Know when to guide, when to police’

‘ As an admin of firm Social Network I come across some impolite improper posts. Just as I was about to fire off a manifesto, I paused and told myself, “let the community respond…don’t speak for everyone.” Within a few minutes, the responses started flying in. The best thing? The responses were mature, helpful and positive. I was so proud of our network. ‘

However, the most common mechanism to ease these risks is using policy. The need for effective policy for Enterprise 2.0 applications has never been more important in today’s changing workplace and technology (workplace policies and procedures). Organizations will need polices as an accountability system to protect themselves and its employees against any legal liabilities issues. As well, policies will help organization in:

Providing guidelines on action to be taken to use social network apps

Clarify user’s rights and responsibilities.

foster stability and continuity

assessing performance and establishing accountability

Saving time, when you face a new problem that could be handled through an existing policy.

Reducing conversation clashes.

Reducing network security issues by maintaining safe \ acceptable use \ best practices in using social network apps to prevent malicious code, viruses, Trojans from ever attacking its network.

Moreover, conducting training programs and creating educational videos would also contribute to alleviate these risks.

Finally, from previous experience, business managers usually will hesitate when it comes to make decision about such emergent technology. Thus, proposing a risk analysis and risk management plan would be essential to have them on board.

For now , I will leave you with this video ’ Managing the risk of social media in hospitals’ and next week, will talk more on managing risks of Enterprise Social networks.

See you then Abdul ,,

References :

Lallana, E. (2010). ICT for Development policy, process and governance: Briefing Note 2. United Nations Asian and Pacific Training Centre for Information and Communication Technology for Development (APCICT).

Serour, M., & Henderson-Sellers, B. (2002). The role of organizational culture on the adoption and diffusion of software engineering process: an empirical study. Proceedings of the Adoption and Diffusion of IT in an Environment of Critical Changes, IFIP TG8, 6, 76-88.

11 comments

Hi,
Able to answer question on which social media is effective and the risk that come along with it is something that is very important in many businesses. Many SME’s are joining the web 2.0 game but many have failed. Some have no knowledge in using social media while some have too little activity going on. While the cost of using social media is free, could this be just an illusion since many company still have to hire IT professional to mange them?

I agree with you Abdul that we don’t need IT professional to be in charge of social medias in SME as many social medias are fairy easy to use and moderate such as Facebook and Twitter. However, to reduce the risk of using social medias in SME is to educate the employee in your firm what they can do with the social medias and what they must not do.

I think the point you make about the line between ‘guiding’ and ‘policing’ is an excellent one. So many organisations do one when they should do one when they should really be doing the other, more often than not guiding instead of policing. My feeling is that users are put off by this before integrated web 2.0 technologies really get a chance to mature. Check out my blog at http://adamhijazi.wordpress.com when you get a chance.

Hi adam
Thank you for your comments
The concept about engaging in social media is voluntarily, so guidance and mentoring is important driving element to encourage users as well as minimizing any misuse or conversational clashes in the future.

The Aurora video is great! Jamie draws a distinction he draws between his own twitter feed and the organisation’s corporate twitter feeds. It’s interesting he feels the need to have a disclaimer that his twitter feed is not representing the organisation’s opinions. This seems to be quite a grey area without common social norms. Perhaps this is a way of determining where a policy is needed to ‘police’, as opposed to the times when the community can self-guide on what’s appropriate? When the community might have a wide diversity of opinions a policy provides clear guidance where as when there are accepted norms the community can self-guide. What do you think?

Hi Amanda
I would say that firms can’t rely entirely on self-guidance because not everyone has the same accepted norms or commonsense .
In addition, businesses can’t take such risk , so they need to clarify rights and responsibilities the best they can (at least those policies that might lead to legal disputes). However, policy will never cover all possibilities\situations so most firms leave that to commonsense.
Cheers

First of all, great post and very informative post! I like the way you structured the information. Second, you mentioned that social media is free. More Individuals, groups and organizations are gradually realizing the potential, effects and the power social media has. For this reason, Face Book has interested a cost to promote posts to appear on the top of a users NewsFeed. From what I can tell, some Web 2.0 tools are introducing costs to what you said was free. It’s kind of like saying “Okay, you want more attention, I’ll give you more fame and attention for $$”. So my question is, what do you think that will most likely happen in the near future with this cost introduced to social media tools. Do you think it will dominate most social media tools? Thoughts?

Hi, thank you for your comment
You are right but as you know the cost will still be relatively cheap, I doubt it will cost much like TV ads.
I just saw an interview with Eric Schmidt (Google Chairman) , he said that 98% of their revenue is from ads not from application’s fees or sales.
Therefore , I think it will continue to be relatively free.